Stuff

[shipperx]

 
New TV. Glad it's around. (And the LSU/Mississippi State game looks better than expected... not that I have a real rooting interest here)


The Secret Circle

*  M'kay, clearly the folks behind TVD.

*  And... I'm intrigued.  Can't say it's 'good' (it's quite cheesy)... but it zips along.

* Too bad the 'fated couple' have no chemistry to speak of.

* I'll probably watch again because it's conveniently TVD adjacent.  Again, not good, but enough mystery and menace that I'll give it a shot. 



The Vampire Diaries

*  Ever notice that vampires can kill instantly after the first sip of blood?  I mean, going by True Blood, they take as much blood during sex as they do when killing someone.  So do they have a special "this isn't sex so it'll kill you" venom where they can kill instantly?

*  Hey, standards and practices, want to explain to me why you can have a head roll off the corpse but we can't even get a good look at  naked Damon?  I mean, we had better looks at naked Spike.  TVD works on a few simple principles.  Naked pretty people is one of them.

*  I have questions of how redemption works in TVD-land... because it seems to involve a lot of people dying so that people can feel bad about... y'know, directly or indirectly causing their death.  

*  It's looking more and more like dating Damon is a death sentence.  Seriously, I think the only one who has slept with him and not ended up dead is Caroline... who wound up a vampire... so still dead. (but getting it on with a werewolf so she's doing alright, I guess)  

*  Hmmm more Damon/Alaric, please.

* Liked the twist with Caroline at the end.

Comments

[lk737.livejournal.com]

thanks for the review on The Secret Circle. i will definitely check it out now. i was on the fence, but i like it when you say you're intrigued. i've stuck in there for less on series. so yay!

i don't watch TVD, but possibly due to lack of naked Damon. i am a vampire purist afterall and believe in equality of nudity for my vampires on tv *kidding* sounds like they don't explain enough with the biting aspect. i never thought of that with the killing bite and the sex bite. hmmmmm.

thanks, again, for the review! *hugs*

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Forewarned: TSC is kinda cheesy and full of mean girls (and some Twilight-iness (Meyer version) that amused me because what's more cheesy than Twilight? Nothing, that's what. :). No way was that accidental. But it does seem to have some underlying menace to it , and that intrigues me. It feels ripe for the one you think is evil isn't going to be and the one you think is good probably isn't. I may be deluding myself though.

And, yes, Damon's best quality is naked (because I can't really call him redeemable)

[sp23.livejournal.com]

* Hmmm more Damon/Alaric, please.

Lord, if only. ;-P

I wasn't really drawn into Circle. I may watch a few more epiosdes to see if it gets better, but the smirky faced 'bad' witch is already working my last nerve.

However, Gale Harold! Being evil! Worth a couple of episode at least.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Smirking girl is so OTT, that I'm waiting for a TVD turn around where we find out that like Caroline she isn't the bad guy here. I think the other girl may possibly be. Or I could be delusional. :)

I was having fun with the Twilighty elements that you just know had to have been requested. It made me giggle.

But there was some sense of underlying menace that made it all tolerable.

[silverusagi]

Seriously, I think the only one who has slept with him and not ended up dead is Caroline

There was always Katherine...

Damon/Alaric is awesome.

The Caroline twist was quite good.

[petzipellepingo.livejournal.com]

More Damon/Alaric needed of course. Lots of plotlines sent in motion and yes, dating Damon is a death sentence.

I taped but haven't watched Secret Circle yet.

[londonkds.livejournal.com]

I have questions of how redemption works in TVD-land... because it seems to involve a lot of people dying so that people can feel bad about... y'know, directly or indirectly causing their death.

Word.

[next_to_normal]

I tried to watch The Secret Circle, but I didn't make it all the way through. Not bad, really, just boring. Then again, TVD's pilot was pretty dreadful, so there's certainly room for improvement.

Ever notice that vampires can kill instantly after the first sip of blood?

I have noticed that! My only explanation is that these vampires do not seem particularly neat about their bites. So it's not just "sipping blood" - it's ripping a giant hole in someone's throat. Which, yeah, would probably lead to swift death. Maybe they are more careful if they don't want to kill the person?

I have questions of how redemption works in TVD-land... because it seems to involve a lot of people dying so that people can feel bad about... y'know, directly or indirectly causing their death.

How do you figure? Because my interpretation is that it's more of a characterization thing. Like, Elena feels responsible for getting her parents and everyone around her killed, so she becomes self-sacrificing to a fault, driven by survivor's guilt. It's taking her to a darker place rather than redeeming her.

And I think with Damon, it's not that redemption involves feeling bad - feeling bad is just a signpost on that path, letting us know where he's going. It's a way of showing his progress: S1 Damon wouldn't have given a crap about Andie's death. S2 Damon could barely keep from killing her himself, but at least he felt bad about it. And S3 Damon feels guilty for getting her killed, for not stopping Stefan, and probably for putting Stefan in this position in the first place.

I don't think we're supposed to think, "Oh, Damon feels bad, that means he's a good guy now!" Frankly, I'm still incredibly annoyed that Andie basically got fridged. But I think we're supposed to see that he IS changing.

Also, yes, more naked!Damon and Damon/Alaric!

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I think it's an offshoot of the extremely high body count on the show. So many red shirts are swiftly killed and so often there are zero repercussions. There are a lot of characters that I like, but I can't think too much about the fact that Caroline murdered an innocent guy in a parking lot. Or that Stefan is off beheading people, but he feels bad about it when he calls Elena. Or that Damon's bed mate dujour bites it because of one thing or another and he feels bad about it.

I like the characters quite often, but soooo many people die for entertainment value rather than compelling character reasons. It might be nice if they slowed down the body count so that when someone dies, it packs more of a punch.

[next_to_normal]

There are a lot of characters that I like, but I can't think too much about the fact that Caroline murdered an innocent guy in a parking lot.

I kind of think that's deliberate, though. Like, the show works to make you complicit in overlooking the killing because it's characters we ~like. The human characters (like Elena, Jeremy, Alaric, etc.) do it, too, excusing all sorts of atrocities. But then you catch yourself sympathizing with the serial killers and it's like, actually, Mrs. Lockwood is the only rational person in the entire town.

I'm hoping that plays out more explicitly this season with Stefan - revealing that the good brother/bad brother dichotomy is false and that 99% of the characters on this show are working with a decidedly murky morality.